More Links for June

need. links.

1. fun hype video from Viridian Space, describing their pursuit of a very-low earth orbit satellite that uses air from the atmosphere's edge as a propulsion resource. this would allow something like perpetual mission duration. early days but seems worth keeping an eye on

2. and as long as we are doing hype videos, consider this one from Boston Dynamics, about recent upgrades for Spot (their robotic dog). most of it concerns deployment as a mobile, general purpose sensor, with ability to walk around & read analog gauges and so on. amazing stuff

3. two interesting pieces on arctic military training & strategy. one on US activities in Alaska (this Bloomberg link might still be unpaywalled and has the advantage of including all images). the other concerns Canada (NYT)

4. and Norway making some promising moves towards seabed mining (FT)

5. wtf i love the minimum wage now (but not actually.. i still think you should help poor ppl mostly by giving them money, instead of trying to screw with prices & the labor market. when it comes to nonprofits, there is tons of dysfunction there but ideally you just eliminate them as a separate tax category)

6. another good piece on India's amazing progress with various kinds of digital technology (biometric id system, mobile payments etc) (Economist). & see also this about the success of India's diaspora (Economist)

7. Ross Douthat on why there have been more ppl in US govt discussing UFOs recently. i enjoyed the piece, although he doesn't really give a firm answer. (NYT). i think all the recent UFO stuff is very obviously total bullshit. Tyler Cowen does frequent credulous posts on the topic, & he's either lost his mind or (more likely) has just gotten a bit too addicted to contrarianism or trolling. although he seems to be backtracking a bit more recently, which is good. Robin Hanson similarly posts really stupid stuff about UFOs, very disappointing (although his grabby aliens work is excellent, and totally different). Eric Hoel had a good piece on UFO deboonking (thread here). & also see Douthat’s followup post in his newsletter, discussing CS Lewis' Space Trilogy (which i've not read.. yet) (NYT)

8. Paragraphica, creative little generative image camera art project

9. long Vulture piece about the economics & business of video streaming. two comments

• it can seem weird to have big industries be largely unprofitable for long stretches of time. but it's not incredibly unusual. set aside even ‘new’ business categories like ride hailing or online shopping that were initially infamous for losing money. you still have many examples in mature industries. consider passenger aviation, certain kinds of solar & wind companies, US oil & gas frackers... it's fine. it's part of our economic system of capital allocation & the discovery process of innovation. of course the chaos & instability that can result from a sudden shakeout of persistently unprofitable firms has downsides: ppl lose jobs, resources & human capital development sunk costs are ‘lost’ etc. but it's part of the glorious process of creative destruction & market dynamism

• i don't think high-quality, big-budget video streaming has much social value. and indeed i think it has quite a lot of harms, degrading people's physical & mental health, social lives etc. if streaming does have a consolidation resulting in lower quantities & qualities produced, higher prices & lower consumption... that seems like an improvement. media & entertainment is a bloated industry, in rich countries at least. reducing its share of gdp would be good

10. good short Progress Forum post arguing for GMO crops, & the mistake of opposing them

11. interesting piece about how the Clean Air Act & EPA limit govt land management agencies' ability to improve wildfire policy (e.g doing more prescribed burns) (Heatmap). see this also from PERC scholar Tate Watkins

12. roll-out flexible solar awning for RVs. yes. this kind of thing is clearly the future, just absolutely dirt-cheap solar surfaces you can put up anywhere

13. quite interesting piece on the concept of 'holobionts' in biology, expanding the idea of microbiomes into a broader unit of symbiotic networks of different species & genetic groupings (Economist)

14. fascinating article about 'unboxed assembly', a new production process approach at Tesla. yet another benefit of electricity over combustion, when it comes to machines

15. very nice Simon Sarris essay on schooling, childhood development. i do grok the argument, & there are real tradeoffs around high-performing/high-potential children. but i’m not as pessimistic about formal schooling in general. one benefit i think many anti-school ppl overlook involves just basic soft skills around professionalism. knowing how to speak/answer questions clearly & directly, making eye contact & being psychologically present, having basic cleanliness & good appearance (& even knowing that you should do these things)… these are not at all universal, especially at the lower end of labor markets or among households with parents that maybe don’t have lots of formal education, or are recent immigrants etc

16. Jonathan Haidt post arguing for phone-free schools, ideally with a policy where students check them in to a 'gun locker' at the beginning of each day & get them back afterwards. seems a little psychotic, idk. to the extent that schools are anachronistic prisons (& again, i’m not 100% on board with this view), it feels like moving in the wrong direction, doubling-down on a rejection of new technology rather than trying to find ways to reformulate education & school structures to work with new tech

17. good article about the recently-launched Caltech space solar demo project. i’ve posted a bunch about this, & despite being exciting it’s probably time to just wait until something actually important happens (grid-connected demo project). i place it in the same category as fusion energy & to a lesser extent advanced geothermal (WSJ)

18. large hotel owner in San Francisco is simply walking away, taking a huge loss

19. itsnotreal launched echobrief, automated transcribing & search. pretty neat

20. once again it is extremely cringe to see coverage of this stuff in mainstream media outlets. but i suppose i must share this piece about the shoggoth ai meme (NYT)

21. Liminal Warmth is posting on substack, recommended

22. you probably already read it, but this AI-optimism post from Mark Andreessen was pretty good. i am more concerned about AI x-risk than he (as some have noted, there’s something a bit strange about arguing AI risk is overrated, then immediately turning around & claiming it’s going to revolutionize every aspect of society). but i agree with Andreessen that some of the recent catastrophism out there is excessive, misguided, &or advancing ulterior motives. & i really agree with his comments about how many ppl seem to have a weirdly poor understanding of the “AI decides to kill all humans” outcome. one may use the word “decides” to describe the decisionmaking process of AGI/ASI, but it’s good to be cautious about projecting human-style psychology onto these systems. that is indeed the entire point of the ‘alien god’/shoggoth memes. imo most scenarios where ASI “decides” to kill everyone resemble more of a “catastrophic mistake” or industrial accident, rather than some highly legible literary villainous scheme. see also this good response post from Dwarkesh Patel

23. obligatory Apple Vision Pro launch video. even if not ultimately successful (unlikely), it will always be remembered as the consumer electronics product that killed the Unabomber. Stratechery had a good piece on it

24. in seriousness though, i did find this obituary of Kaczynski to be pretty interesting & thorough (NYT)

25. Sam Hammond on US capital flows. he calls for some capital controls... idk

26. article about that plan to build a desalination plant in Mexico & pipe water to Arizona. no doubt it would be insanely expensive, far more than the various theoretical alternatives (market reforms, conservation, efficiency, recycling etc). but there's something to be said for the exuberance of an abundance-mindset megaproject. it sings to my heart much more than agriculture water market tinkering (obv we can/should do both). i’m not concerned about the ecological effects of the pipeline (that national monument area is indeed beautiful tho, & worth visiting). the brine discharge effects on fishing seem more significant, but also not as terrible as some ppl claim. of course Mexico has to agree, even if AZ wants it & offers a good deal (NYT)

27. Bryan Caplan guest post on market urbanism. i am a big fan, although the piece is correct that it’s not a “real” movement— just two dueling blogs. Strong Towns on the other hand is very much real & influential, both intellectually & in practical politics. it differs in sometimes-subtle ways from market urbanism & pure libertarian philosophy wrt urbanism, but also overlaps heavily

28. Conversations with Tyler episode with Peter Singer, interesting of course

29. long and good post defending Guns, Germs & Steel

books

Is Remote Warfare Moral?: Weighing Issues of Life and Death from 7,000 Miles by Joseph Chapa. i am always complaining about nonfiction books written by journalists who drop into a subject & struggle to have things to say, vs subject-matter experts that write books as a way to boil down long-marinating thoughts & ideas. this is more the latter, and as a result it’s better than several previous books i’ve read on the general topic. the author is a US air force officer who actually did drone warfare, & also an academic philosopher. some of the philosophy stuff is pretty meh, & the best parts focus on the development of military drones, & how the technology is incorporated into existing defense bureaucracies & processes. a key argument is that remote warfare (vs fully autonomous) isn't really a paradigm-shift from piloted aircraft, because even piloted aircraft are heavily technologized / mediated by computers. both things are complex socio-technical systems. so a lot of drone warfare is more of an incremental change than is commonly understood; the meme about "push button" warfare is kinda wrong. there is interesting stuff about what martial virtue & military ethics means for remote warriors. lots to argue with, and the author makes some strong claims. recommended